Description
OpenBao is an open source identity-based secrets management system. Prior to 2.5.5, an authenticated OpenBao caller with write access to transit/keys/* could terminate the server process by setting derived to true while the type parameter selected rsa-, ecdsa-, or ed25519. The Transit policy creation path in builtin/logical/transit/backend.go and sdk/helper/keysutil/policy.go could reach an error path that double-unlocked a mutex while handling this invalid asymmetric derived-key combination, causing a panic, no HTTP response, process exit, and denial of service. JSON and HCL key-creation requests can express the triggering combination. This issue is fixed in version 2.5.5.
Affected products
| Vendor | Product | Affected | Fixed |
|---|---|---|---|
| openbao | openbao | < 2.5.5 | — |
Fixed in Linux distributions
Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.
openSUSE
Security tracker ↗| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| openSUSE Leap 16.0 | govulncheck-vulndb | 0.0.20260723T184607-160000.1.1 | openSUSE-SU-2026:21483-1 |
Affected packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Affected | Fixed | Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Go | github.com/openbao/openbao | >= 0.1.0, <= 2.5.4 | — | GHSA-8w8f-r2xv-4q4j |
| Go | github.com/openbao/openbao | < 0.0.0-20260617104123-db57c62602b2 | 0.0.0-20260617104123-db57c62602b2 | GHSA-8w8f-r2xv-4q4j |
| Go | github.com/openbao/openbao | < 0.0.0-20260617104123-db57c62602b2 · >= 0.1.0 | 0.0.0-20260617104123-db57c62602b2 | GO-2026-5267 |
Advisories 2
- WID-SEC-2026-2028 OpenBao: Mehrere Schwachstellen BSI CERT-Bund (WID) · Sep 15, 2026
- openSUSE-SU-2026:21483-1 Security update for govulncheck-vulndb SUSE / openSUSE Security Updates · Jul 31, 2026
References
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/security/advisories/GHSA-8w8f-r2xv-4q4j
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/pull/3309
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/pull/3312
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/commit/bb17827f3e33779a10166f7d0e61b191c0facef9
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/commit/db57c62602b25da12951f3f0edb888e7c4da61e5
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/releases/tag/v2.5.5
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/releases/tag/v2.6.0